[mythtv-users] Hauppauge in trouble with the FCC

[Michael T. Dean]

On 03/07/2008 05:14 PM, Craig G. wrote:
> Its not just a labeling issue, the FCC also has some nice language in 
> there to potentially fine anyone who manufactures for sale in the U.S. 
> a "TV Receiver" which doesn't include a digital tuner.
>  
> "By Law, as of March 1, 2007, all television receivers shipped in 
> interstate commerce or imported into the United States must contain a 
> digital tuner."
>  
> Which is fairly short cited, as they don't seem to really define what 
> a "television receiver" is.   I assume it was aimed at set top boxes 
> and televisions, but the fact that it keeps someone from manufacturing 
> a product for a specific market (such as analog cable tv use) without 
> putting a ATSC tuner in it.

So, does this mean that Hauppauge won't even be able to, i.e., rip the 
POS^H^H^HNTSC tuner out of the card and sell it as an S-Video/Composite 
only capture card?  Are they going to be forced to sell it with an ATSC 
tuner?  I happen to know of one person who explicitly does not want to 
upgrade to ATSC because of the significant increase in filesize (and, 
therefore, required storage).

At least the ATSC tuner is relatively cheap--cheap compared to the ATSC 
decoders that the FCC forced me to buy in my HDTV so I could just 
disable it when I plugged in my Myth box...

Mike